By Eli Soderberg
The tap water in Robeson County often looks clear to the eye. It fills bathtubs, boils pasta and cleans children’s hands. But beneath the surface lies a question no one here can truly answer: What’s actually in it? In a community already burdened by industrial waste, environmental injustice and a high poverty rate, the uncertainty in their faucets becomes another danger they never agreed to carry; all while the law meant to protect them is becoming more lenient.
Legal limits versus safe limits
In 1972, the EPA established the Clean Water Act under which the EPA sets out a maximum contaminant level, MCL, for over 100 contaminants, with which state and local utilities should comply. However, they are more known as advisories and states are left to enforce them. Every public water utility must test its water for these contaminants and present its results to the public in its annual Consumer Confidence Report (CCR) and Annual Drinking Water Quality Report.
When looking at the CCR from Robeson County, there are no severely alarming numbers and the Annual Drinking Water Quality Report showed only combined radium as high, which is a naturally occurring contaminant that can pose a health risk at higher concentrations. However, Gary Davenport, Water Treatment Superintendent at Robeson County Public Utilities, said, “It was in one of our water plants and we actually abandoned that well. In all the other wells that we are using, we had no issues with radium.”
This might sound like music to some people’s ears, but unfortunately, it is not that simple. As the Environmental Working Group emphasizes, legal limits do not necessarily equate to safe limits. The EWG has therefore set up its own proposed limits, which they contend could be considered safe. When looking at the comparison between the levels of the contaminants and the limits set by the EWG, Robeson County’s water quality becomes a huge red warning sign. There were 12 detected contaminants that exceeded the EWG limits at an alarming rate. The full list can be found on EWG’s website. The worst one on the list is Perfluorohexane sulfonate (PFHXS), which was found 668 times above EWG’s Health Guideline. PFHXS is part of a group called PFAS, which has become one of the most persistent and worrisome problems in North Carolina’s water and Robeson County is no exception. PFAS are also known as Forever Chemicals due to their strong chemical bonds, which make them more resistant to breaking down in the environment and the human body. Therefore, they can accumulate in humans and nature for a long time, posing long-lasting health risks. They can be found in numerous products: Non-stick cookware, stain-resistant products, paint, fast food packaging, cosmetics and firefighting foam. Some residue from production using Forever Chemicals has leaked out into nature, contaminating soil, water and wildlife.
The CCR and other reports still do not tell the full story. There are still many contaminants that go undetected because they are not required to be tested for, and the reports may not be completely accurate. Moira Lauer, chemistry professor at UNCP, says, “I have lots of issues with the Robeson County water reports. We are doing some tap water analysis right now in my research group and so far our numbers are not closely aligning with theirs at all.” In their testing, they focused on nitrate, which Robeson County water reports as not detected, but Lauer’s numbers are “definitely detectable.” Whether the difference depends on playing with numbers and picking a good day where it cannot be detected or because their experimental methods are poor is something Lauer cannot be sure of. However, it raises an acute question: Can the reports be trusted?
Davenport’s explanation for the varying numbers was that the two samples were taken at different times of the year and therefore, the numbers varied. The state does not require utilities to sample their water at a specific time, as long as testing is conducted at some point each year.
The ‘Forever Chemicals’
Remember those PFHXS that were found at 668 times above the EWG’s limits? Those are part of a group of 12,000 man-made chemicals known as Forever Chemicals. The most troubling aspect of the Forever Chemicals is that they can pose serious health risks, such as cancer, at very low levels because they do not break down in nature or in humans. It makes them very difficult to test for, since testing for such small numbers requires extensive testing methods, which are extremely expensive. Therefore, it can be a great challenge for utilities in low-income areas, such as Robeson County, that may not have the technology needed to test for PFAS. The reports from the Robeson County Water System do not disclose any information about PFAS in their water, despite conducting PFAS testing in collaboration with the private testing laboratory Great Lakes Testing in Wisconsin. Davenport confirmed they had the results from the Great Lakes Lab but would not provide them. When attempting to contact someone else from the Robeson County Public Utilities, they could not be reached.
The PFAS results from Robeson County available to the public come from the EWG, which put together an interactive map looking at PFAS around the country. The results were reported via UCMR 5, the Fifth Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule. The Robeson County Water System, which serves 65,303 people, had numerous contaminants exceeding proposed legal limits. The report from the EWG makes it evident that PFAS are in the water that the Robeson County community drinks and cooks with every day.
Laws and regulations
PFAS are a group of contaminants that are being looked into more and regulations are slowly taking form, in comparison to the other legal limits that have remained unchanged since 1990. PFAS and PFOS had, for a long time, remained unregulated with no legal limits set. But in April 2024, under the Biden administration, the EPA introduced the first national standard to regulate six specific PFAS in drinking water and established MCLs. While it was threatened to be revoked by the new Trump administration, a less strict version of the National Primary Drinking Water Regulation was finalized in May 2025.
In the less strict version, the EPA plans to scrap three types of PFAS from monitoring, one being known as GenX, which is prevalent in North Carolina. According to the EPA website, the final rule requires “Public water systems must monitor for these PFAS and have three years to complete initial monitoring (by 2027)” and present the results to the public. “Public water systems have five years (by 2029) to implement solutions that reduce these PFAS if monitoring shows that drinking water levels exceed these MCLs.” Lastly, beginning in 2029, “public water systems that have PFAS in drinking water which violate one or more of these MCLs must take action to reduce levels of these PFAS in their drinking water and must provide notification to the public of the violation.”
Davenport explains they are already trying to modify their main water plant, which is one in Maxton. “We are going to start using activated charcoal, and that is supposed to remove whatever is in the water pertaining to the PFAS.”
Professor Lauer explains that activated charcoal, sometimes referred to as activated carbon, is currently the industry standard for PFAS removal since it is both effective and relatively cheap. Activated carbon varies widely in performance, depending on its quality and chemical treatment, as well as packing and flow rate. It also adsorbs many contaminants, not just PFAS, so it needs frequent replacement, she said.
Despite the establishment of the National Primary Drinking Water Regulation, environmental experts worry that it is too lenient. PFAS are not removed by conventional water treatment systems and therefore, it is important to stop the pollution at its source, which is industrial waste management. Melanie Benesh, vice president for government affairs at the EWG, said in a statement in January 2025, “[The new regulation is] giving polluters a green light to continue poisoning our water and communities without fear of consequences.”
The setbacks on the EPA rules are caused by the Trump Environmental Protection Agency withdrawing a pending Biden administration plan in the final step before approval and implementation. The proposed plan was the first national, legally enforceable drinking water standard to protect communities from PFAS. However, now communities are left to fend for themselves and for poorer communities such as Pembroke, North Carolina, that can become more difficult if there is no federal funding or federal enforcement.
Professor Lauer mentions treatment proposals such as reverse osmosis, activated carbon and ionic exchange that are very expensive for municipal water companies. “[It can be] really problematic for regions, especially where people cannot afford to or know how to filter their own water,” said Lauer. Without strong national regulations, vulnerable areas, such as Robeson County, are left to fend for themselves. Elvis Kamau, a UNC Pembroke nursing student who is researching drinking water, said, “It is hard for them [the Pembroke community] to spend a lot of money on water safety. You can’t compare here and big cities, because big cities have more money to invest in clean water.” Smaller communities are more reliant on help from the federal government to tackle the environmental issues troubling their communities. Otherwise, it can have devastating effects. As of Nov. 24 Davenport reports they have not received any federal funding to implement treatment methods.
Personal stories
A UNCP student and Pembroke resident knows the town’s water problems in a way most people never should. The summer between her eighth- and ninth-grade years, she was suddenly diagnosed with encephalitis, a dangerous swelling of the brain. Doctors suspected it had been triggered by a stomach bug typically picked up from contaminated freshwater or crowded water parks. But she hadn’t been near anything like that. The only water she had touched was her own. Just days before she became sick, the shower water in her home had turned a brown tint, a sight all too familiar in Pembroke whenever construction stirs up the system.
At UNCP, my three roommates and I live in an on-campus apartment and have been dealing with brown tap water since August. Despite months of back-and-forth with housing and maintenance, the discoloration keeps returning, but only in our apartment unit. Officials most often blame construction or hydrant flushing, reasons that, so far, have done little to reassure us.
“The scary part is just not knowing what is causing it and whether it is dangerous or not,” said Reagan Carr, one of my roommates. “Having brown water just can’t be healthy. Until I know what’s wrong with it, I won’t drink or cook with it.”
Since the water kept turning a brown color, samples of their water were picked up on Nov. 17 by Pierre Locklear, Public Services Director with the Town of Pembroke, for testing by Environmental Hazards Services in Chesterfield, Virginia.On Dec. 4 we received an email from Kyle Smith, Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs, that said, “So the results came back from the company as inconclusive with a disclaimer that the test was run outside of the window/timeframe for accurate testing.” In the email, Smith said another sample would be picked up by Rich Smith, UNCP Facilities Superintendent, who will “work directly with the company who runs the test to ensure the test is run in the correct manner and in a timely fashion.”
“I’m frustrated and annoyed,” said Carr. “I just want to know what we have been drinking for the past 4 months or so.” For the time being, a filter has been installed, which has eliminated the discoloration.
These isolated issues reflect a broader frustration in the community. On Nov. 4, 2024, Yvonne Barnes Dial presented a petition during a town board meeting with nearly 40 signatures from Pembroke residents complaining about the quality of their tap water. The petition mentions rusty, discolored water that stains clothes and has an odor.
Additionally, in the Robeson County board meeting on September 15 of this year, Robeson County residents fought against the expansion of the Robeson County landfill by St. Pauls, where unusually high levels of PFAS have been found, according to Sybil Farr, the director of St. Pauls’ Community Action for Progress. Farr also had a petition with 588 signatures from residents demanding change and improvements in the PFAS contamination in their water.
The Southern Environmental Law Center recommended “the county to stop allowing waste from the Fayetteville Works facility, which includes Chemours and DuPont, to be discharged at the Robeson County landfill,” as a preventable source of contamination. Lauer said, “It is one of those problems that are easier to address at sort of the point of release rather than trying to clean it up later.”
Until the PFAS spills have been cleaned up, Robeson County is recommended to stop using water from its Rocco Water Treatment Plant since it has the highest PFAS readings of any water treatment plant in the state, SELC said in September.
For homeowners in Robeson County, consider installing a home filter to filter your tap water. The EWG recommends four: Zero Water, Travel Berkey, Epic Water Filter and Clearly filtered.
An interactive map of water plants and contamination sources mentioned in the article: